Emergence  Chapter 1  Ostagar
by Rhiyah
Summary: Hawke endeavors to help her friends, old and new, and meets a sexy elf who takes her breath away. Now if he can just stop pissing everyone off, life would be dandy in Kirkwall.


Hawke sat on her bedroll, whetstone in hand, methodically sharpening her sword. The blade edge was sharp enough to split a hair, but still she continued working. It was meditative and helped to calm her nerves.

They'd been camped here at Ostagar for nearly two weeks. Waiting. Whether they were merely waiting for the darkspawn or more reinforcements, the rank and file were never told. They just had orders to make ready and stay ready. So that's what Hawke did.

Reynard and the others managed to round up a bottle of spirits, and they sat around the campfire, passing it between them. She turned down the offer to join them, choosing instead to stay sober and prepared.

Something was about to happen. She could feel it in the air. Earlier the bird sounds had quieted, as if before a big storm. The sky remained clear aside from the blanket of fog-like smoke caused by a hundred different campfires. By dusk even the insect chatter had dwindled until the night was ominously silent outside of the army camps.

Something was certainly about to happen, and she had to warn her brother. Not that he'd thank her for the consideration, but Hawke had promised Mother that she'd look out for him. With that in mind, setting aside her sword, she rose to her feet.

Grimly, Hawke strode into Carver's camp, dismayed to see how complacent these green recruits had become with the lull in action. Disgust and fear for his safety made her bristle, but her hands were proverbially tied. Her captain had denied the request to have Carver transferred, and there was little else she could do but watch and worry.

"Look everyone, Carver's mommy has come to check up on him!"

Guffaws rumbled amongst the group until she turned her pale gaze on the speaker. Saying nothing, she merely arched a brow, maintaining eye contact until the laughter died down. Suddenly, the soldiers found the ground and their bedrolls far more interesting than before.

A wry twist to her lips, she walked past Carver.

"Come with me."

She didn't stop to see if he would follow, and she knew that this too would make him angry. She did not have time for pleasantries, and she had not the patience to assuage his wounded pride. Besides, until he had more sense than pride, he'd never appreciate why she did the things she did, nor would he truly be a man instead of a petulant, overgrown child.

Once she'd moved far enough from the camp, she turned and watched Carver stalk up to her.

"Andraste's ass, Sister! Must you always belittle me in front of the others?" Carver fumed.

With a snort and a dismissive gesture she rounded on him. "I didn't do any such thing and, furthermore, those vermin aren't worth your effort, Carver, or your indignation."

"Those vermin are my friends, _Hawke_." Carver fairly snarled the name they both shared, but for some reason, he felt he had no right to.

Sighing, she scrubbed a hand over her eyes, and ruffling the short fringe of dark hair on her brow. Maker's balls, why must they always be at each other's throats?

"Look, Carv, I'm sorry. I didn't come over here to start shit with you. Or cause problems with your friends."

He looked mildly appeased, but continued to hold a defiant posture, arms crossed over his chest. "Then what the hell do you want, Greyling?"

Frustrated, she hissed in annoyance. "Listen to the night, Carver. Do you hear it?" She looked at him fiercely.

Carver closed his eyes, listening. After a few moments, he opened them and frowned. "I don't hear anything but the soldiers."

Nodding at him, she leaned closer, firmly grabbing his biceps. "Exactly, it's too damn quiet. Something is on the air tonight. Tomorrow… maybe even in the morning hours, something is going to happen. I don't know what, but I can feel it all the same. I came to warn you. Be ready, because the wait is nearly done."

She squeezed his arms once, her pale gray eyes staring into his amber ones. He nodded at her, and satisfied that she had done what she could to keep him safe tonight, Hawke turned back to her own camp.

The next morning she awoke to cries of alarm and the distant sounds of battle. Reynard was shouting at her as he roused the others. Jumping from her bedroll, Hawke took a moment to bank the smoldering fire. Scooping up her sword, she loped down to where the troops were gathering into formations.

It was nearly mid-morning when she realized that she'd lost sight of Carver. Unable to break ranks to search for him, she tried to put that from her mind and focus on the task at hand. Though the darkspawn clearly outnumbered them, the Fereldans were mostly holding the lines, waiting for the signal that would bring in Teyrn Loghain's troops for reinforcements.

By late afternoon Hawke knew the battle was lost. The signal fire blazed atop the tower in Ostagar, but Loghain's troops had fled in retreat, leaving the King's army to be massacred.

Now she fought only when she must but otherwise had begun to focus all her efforts on locating Carver. Several yards ahead, lying amid a pile of darkspawn bodies, she spied the distinctive copper hair of his captain. With fear in her gut, she raced forward to search through the corpses; she was relieved not to find Carver. But if he wasn't here with his fallen regiment, Maker's breath, where the hell was he?

Hearing the twang of a bow, Hawke listened a moment, then turned to run up a small hill to the north. When she crested the top she spied Carver taking cover behind a small pile of rocks as several genlock archers kept him pinned down.

With a fearsome cry, Hawke charged down the hill toward the darkspawn. Sword held angled over her shoulder, she used the momentum of her descent to pack additional force when she swung the blade, lopping the head off the closest genlock. She turned her face away as a spray of blood gushed from the creature.

"Carver, stay down!" Shouting at her brother, Hawke advanced on the two remaining darkspawn. Arrows pinged harmlessly off her heavy plate, and with a final burst of speed, she collided into the archers, knocking them to the ground.

He was beside her then, thrusting his own weapon into one of the fallen genlocks. With a grunt and a twist, Carver killed the wretch before it could regain its senses. Panting, she looked him over closely, examining his padded leather armor. Content that he was unharmed, Hawke then carefully cleaned her sword blade.

"Come. We must be away from here quickly." Hawke saw his shoulders tighten and tried to hide her surprise when he rounded on her in fury.

"Away from here? You'd have us leave our fellow soldiers to these darkspawn? Are you insane, or perhaps just a coward, Greyling?" Carver fairly spit as he said her name.

Feeling her eyebrows creep up, she struggled to maintain her composure. He was in shock, she reminded herself, and had never seen combat of this extent. To that matter, neither had she, but it wasn't her first experience with fighting for her life.

"Carver, the battle is lost. Look around you, there are more dead than there are alive. The darkspawn will be moving north before the day is done. Loghain's troops have retreated; the King's regiments as well as the Grey Wardens are defeated. There is nothing left for us here but death."

She paused a moment, then grabbed him by the shoulders. "Carv, they will head _north_. That means to Lothering. Mother and Bethany are alone, with no one to protect them. The bann's men have abandoned the village; the Templars have no hope of defending it against this horde. Lothering _will_ fall."

His eyes widened with understanding and fear. "Yes… sorry, I… you're right."

Nodding brusquely, Hawke turned to survey the area to gain her bearings. "We don't have time to back track to gather any supplies. If you spot anything worth stopping for, shout out. Otherwise, we run, Carver. We run until we must break for rest, and even then resting but a short while. It is our only hope of saving them before the darkspawn horde arrives."

Carver jerked his head in assent, and then they were on their way. Running north to Lothering, the darkspawn at their heels, the siblings were finally at one purpose together.


End file.
